260616: The Archipelago
Liberalism is built on the notion of many peaks, and the subjectivity of "elevation," in matters of personal and cultural development.
Liberalism says that a man knows best what is best for him; and there is no single standard of judgment—only "different strokes, for different folks." Coupled, perhaps, with the elective affiliation of "follow your vibe, and find your tribe."
Liberalism says that a man's house is his kingdom, and that his way of life cannot be interfered with, unless it interferes with the lives of others. This is known as the principle of harm, or the nose & fist rule. Your right to swing a fist ends where my nose begins.
It has been a constant temptation to extend the liberal philosophy from the national governance of individuals, to the global governance of nations. This temptation is epitomized by what, in rationalist circles, has been called Archipelago Theory.
Archipelago Theory is not, as commonly supposed, a rationalist imaginary. It has been explored and reinvented time & time again. Nozick's meta-utopia; Kukathas's Liberal Archipelago; Édouard Glissant, in Poetics of Relation; Land and Yarvin, with their patchwork model; and finally, Scott Alexander, at Slate Star Codex.
Critical to—and grossly complicating—the archipelagian model is the notion of consent. Citizens in such a world must have a right to exit, to vote with their feet and freely choose which state to serve.
Consent and voluntariness: These are values which our Secular Age holds sacred, as terminal goods.
They are also terrifically complicated concepts, which we still do not fully understand—complicated by questions of free will and determinism; by questions of rhetoric and persuasion; by questions of seduction and beauty; by questions of power, and desire, and the mimetics of desire.